Taking pulse rate and respiratory rate for 5 seconds?

[heavenjoans7]

Hi, I just wanted to know if 5 seconds is enough for taking pulse rates and respiratory rates as well? I have taken the pulse rate on myself to try out and seems accurate compared to 15-30 seconds. I always got the same result with all times. How long have you guys taken it for? Because I know from my ride alongs that it is hard to take pulse rate and even respiratory rate in the rig because of all the jumps and stuff, so I am asking to see if 5 seconds is ok so that way I am bale to do it in a stop or when the rig is not jumping too much.

 

[Akulahawk]

5 seconds isn't enough if you're going for accuracy. I might check for 6 seconds to get a general impression of too fast, about right, or too slow, but if I want accuracy, I'm going to count for 15, 30, or 60 seconds, depending upon the specific situation. Also, with practice/experience in the ambulance, you'll be able to count pulses/resps without too much difficulty.

 

[mgr22]

When you're doing a quick pulse check, you're really just trying to get a sense of rate, regularity and strength. The regularity part requires more than 5 seconds.

You can take a pulse during your initial patient interview. Just get a sense of whether it's too fast or too slow, unusually weak or strong, and regularly irregular or irregularly irregular. If it's none of those things and the patient's talking to you, you can probably delete the E from that EMS call.

You can check the pulse again later for the actual rate.

 

[Ewok Jerky]

Agree with those above.

Additionally, when you are practicing on yourself, I assume you are a young, healthy individual with no history of arhythmia. As such, your HR is not only regular, but probably even predictable, and it doesn't vary as much as a sick, old, dying, traumatic, shock patient.

 

[zzyzx]

When you are new to EMS, you really ought to check pulse and respiratory rates for 30 seconds.
Once you have a lot of experience, checking the pulse for 10 seconds is reasonable in most cases. Just by looking at someone for a few moments will give you an idea of what their respiratory rate is.
The exceptions are very slow and very fast heart rates or respiratory rates.

 

[Emtgirl8555]

Hi, I just wanted to know if 5 seconds is enough for taking pulse rates and respiratory rates as well? I have taken the pulse rate on myself to try out and seems accurate compared to 15-30 seconds. I always got the same result with all times. How long have you guys taken it for? Because I know from my ride alongs that it is hard to take pulse rate and even respiratory rate in the rig because of all the jumps and stuff, so I am asking to see if 5 seconds is ok so that way I am bale to do it in a stop or when the rig is not jumping too much.

Don't be afraid to dig in deep for the pulse. Don't cut yourself short with five seconds and risk an inaccurate or uncertain information. Take that extra 10 to 25 second to eliminate doubt.

 

[joshrunkle35]

Checking for a pulse is different than taking a pulse rate. For example, you have someone with an arterial bleed in a limb, you place a tourniquet and they loose consciousness. I might check to make sure I don't find a pulse in the limb that should be occluded, and check the opposing limb to make sure that it is still being perfused. Those would be less than 5 seconds on each limb. Then, I'd get going ASAP and as soon as I could, I'd do a check for the pulse rate, which should not simply be the amount of pulses observed per minute, but also the rhythm, depth, quality and similarity/equality (for example, to an opposing limb when they should be equal). This should take about 30 seconds. A full minute is too long, but sometimes 15 seconds is not enough to notice mild irregularities.

 

[johnrsemt]

If you only check resp rate for 5-6 seconds and they are breathing 8-10 times a minute are you going to put in your report that their RR was 0? because you will have a very good chance of that happening to you.
I will do a quick check for a few seconds when I make first patient contact, but as others have said, I am checking for strength, regular/irregular, skin temp, diaphoresis, etc quality, not quantity